Be Our Ally
"Be Our Ally" is a project I had the honor to work on with artistic director of Sheatre Joan Chandler of and musician david sereda. It was initally funded by the Canada Council for the Arts.
"Be Our Ally” (BOA) teaches youth about homophobic bullying, how homophobia hurts us all, and how we can all take action to prevent victimization and create a social willingness to change. BOA gives new words and voices to LGBTQ youth, and energizes others to be allies. It is shameful that we live in a society where people who are seen to love “differently” are targets of hate crimes and discrimination. We believe that we must begin to reshape the words and values that create victims of hate crimes in the LGTBQ community.
These images are portraits of LGBTQ youth and their allies. The exhibition, supported with audio messages, sheds light on the strength, fragility and resiliency of youth, including youth of different sexual orientations, and their allies in our community. Observers comment: “powerful”, “real”, “they look just like people”.
The exhibition has been at the Tom Thomson Art Gallery, the SPARC Conference at the Haliburton School of the Arts, Rail’s End Gallery (Haliburton), and opened Lift Ground Print Studio/Gallery, Huntsville.
